A group of six or seven men climbed out of the Landcruiser, they were fierce looking, they were Dayak forest workers. Ennis could see at least three of them were carrying pahangs, large machetes normally used for clearing undergrowth in the forest; one of them with long hair and a Mexican style moustache stepped forward. In his hand he held a filthy jute sack tied with an old piece of string, he threw the sack on the floor, no word was spoken, they waited.
The Dayak stepped forward and bent over, his pahang in his right hand, and deftly cut the string, with his left hand he took the sack by one of the corners and pulled it sharply, a blackish ball or lump fell on the ground. Ennis concentrated his regard on the object, trying to distinguish what it was.
He gave a gasp, it was a head, a human head, the same man pushed it with the tip of his boot, it rocked and rolled slightly, coming to rest on one side.
Ennis felt his stomach heave and his bowels weaken.
‘Jesus Christ Almighty!’ said Ennis lowly, ‘It’s Soetrisno.’
He had recognised Soetrisno’s buckteeth and his curly hair, which was now matted and dry, stuck against his skull.
‘Who are these men, what has happened, where did they come from?’ he shouted to those near him.
He turned sharply and ran towards the camp manager’s office where he had last seen Riady.
‘Riady, Riady!’ he shouted at the top of his voice.
Riady appeared at the door, blinking in the bright sunlight, with a perplexed expression on his face looking at the apparent distress of Ennis.
‘What’s wrong?’ said Riady hesitatingly.
‘Soetrisno has been killed, his head is there,’ he said pointing to the group that was gathering at the entrance to the camp.
‘What do you mean?’ he said walking towards Ennis.
They both half ran towards the group.
‘Killed, who has been killed?’
‘Soetrisno!’
Riady pushed through the crowd, looking on the ground as though he expected to see a body; Soetrisno’s head was still lying in the same place. The onlookers stared silently at the head, it now seemed small, the eyes were half closed, they were like black slits, flies were crawling over the face.
Riady spoke sharply in Indonesian; ‘What happened, who found this?’ The man who had brought the sack stepped forward.
‘We found it in the forest Bak, by the side of the road about five kilometres from here.’
‘The villagers on the river near the rafting point found it and gave it to the logging workers.’
‘Where did they find it then?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Ask them then for Christ sake,’ said Ennis angrily.
Riady started talking to them there was a long exchange.
‘We better go to the village, they,’ he said point at the men with the pahangs, ‘don’t know.’
‘Right let’s go.’
They jumped into their Landcruiser, taking with them two of the men who had brought Soetrisno’s to the camp. The village was five kilometres from the camp and they were there in ten minutes, Riady pulled up at the foot of a rickety stairway leading up to a long house.
It was a typical of a river side village in Borneo, a few long wooden houses on stilts, built on the edge of the river, with shaky string walkways joining them together, probably a couple of hundred or so people lived there.
Night was falling as a young man showed them to the headman’s house; the light was weak as they were beckoned to enter. Ennis could make out several old men crouched in a semi-circle, smoking thick cigarettes rolled in wild tobacco leaves and drinking from small glasses.
Riady bowed to what Ennis supposed to be the headman and exchanged greetings pointing with his thumb to Ennis. The old man smiled politely showing his black teeth several of which were missing; his eyes glinted in the feeble light of an oil lamp. Ennis could see that one of his eyes was white, glaucoma.
‘Ask him about Soetrisno’
‘That’s what I’m about to do’
There was another exchange.
‘What did he say?’
‘He said he doesn’t know Soetrisno’
‘Ask him about the head’
‘He said it was found down there this afternoon,’ pointing to the walkway, ‘hey gave it to the loggers who had stopped by to eat.’
‘Who put it there?’
‘He doesn’t know’
They returned to the camp where the manager radioed to the police at Bandjarmasin to inform them. Soetrisno’s head was placed in a plastic bag and put in the refrigerator of the guesthouse.
‘Who killed him?’ Ennis asked Riady.
‘How do I know,’ he replied.
‘You must have an idea, why?’
‘There are many things you don’t understand here,’ he paused and looked at Ennis, ‘you remember the accident?’
‘With the logging truck?’
‘Yes, well it probably wasn’t an accident.’
‘Yes we guessed that,’ he stopped as if thinking hard, ‘you mean that this could be linked with that.’
‘It is, it’s a warning to you.’
‘To me!’
‘Yes, you represent the foreigners here, that’s all that matters to them and they want you to go.’
‘Who?’
‘It’s complicated, but the tribal people.’
‘The tribe people!’
‘Yes, they have very superstitious beliefs and the loggers use them, by putting ideas into their heads, they have probably told them that you will bring evil spirits to the area.’
‘Evil spirits, that’s crazy.’
‘Not at all, for the villagers here in the forest spirits are very real, remember most of those old men you saw were hunters as young men and they hunted not only animals.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘The oldest were certainly head hunters.’
DOWN TO EARTH